Petros Singers Recital

Petros Singers’ Spem in Alium singing workshop culminates in this hour-long recital. Over the course of the day, experienced amateur singers will have worked in eight individual choirs, each led by a professional singer, to explore and learn Thomas Tallis’ seminal work. In addition to the Workshop Choir, you will hear performances by the professional workshop leaders (singing together as The Garter Consort) and by Petros Singers.

The recital will place Tallis’ 40-part motet within the context of his other choral works, as well as works by his pupil, William Byrd, who died 400 years ago in 1623. There are few composers who mastered their craft as definitively as did Tallis, particularly notable when you consider the historic religious upheaval that dominated, and determined, his artistic life. While Spem in Alium represents the apotheosis of his approach, his smaller motets are no less miraculous. Moreover, by first teaching and then going into business with Byrd, Tallis was able to shape the second generation of Anglican choral music, as he had defined the first, as well as leaving his stamp on the early English Madrigal.

This influence will be explored in our recital as we place the music of these two great English composers alongside each other. In addition, Petros Singers will perform our 40th-anniversary commission by Kerensa Briggs – St Peter –continuing the Anglican choral tradition pioneered by Tallis and Byrd into the 21st Century.

Programme
Spem in Alium – Thomas Tallis
Sung by the Workshop Choir

Loquebantur variis linguis – Thomas Tallis
Justorum Animae – William Byrd
St Peter – Kerensa Briggs
Miserere Nostri – Thomas Tallis
Sung by Petros Singers

When shall my sorrowful sighing slake – Thomas Tallis
Ye Sacred Muses – William Byrd
Ave Verum Corpus – William Byrd
Domine quis habitabit – William Byrd
Sung by The Garter Consort

Sing and Glorify (Spem in Alium contrafactum) – Thomas Tallis
Sung by the Workshop Choir

The Garter Consort
The Garter Consort is the vocal arm of Richard Bannan’s professional orchestra, The Garter Ensemble, and includes many of the finest consort singers working in the UK. The group takes its name from The Most Honourable and Noble Order of the Garter, the mother church of which is St George’s Chapel, where Richard (Petros Singers’ Musical Director) sings daily services as part of the choir.

Sopranos
Miriam Allan (Les Arts Florissants, Collegium Vocale Gent)
Laura Oldfield (Tenebrae, The Cardinall’s Musick)
Altos
Lucy Goddard (Exaudi, Orlando Chamber Choir)
Lissie Paul (The Tallis Scholars, The Queen’s Six)
Tenors
Tom Robson (The Sixteen, Chichester Chorale)
Toby Ward (Ensemble Pro Victoria, Petros Singers’ singing teacher)
Basses
Nick Ashby (King’s Singers, Petros Singers’ Patron)
Will Dawes (Stile Antico, Somerville College Oxford)

Recital tickets £10 available from PETROS SINGERS.